Infants and children are generally more susceptible than adults to harmful effects from the environment such as sun rays and air pollutants.
Ultraviolet (UV) radiation is a form of electromagnetic radiation that can be found in sunlight. High energy UV rays often have enough energy to ionize an atom or molecule and can damage DNA in the cells of our body, which in turn may lead to cancer. An infant's skin possesses little melanin, the pigment that gives color to skin, hair and eyes and provides some sun protection. Accordingly, infants and young children are especially susceptible to the sunlight's damaging effects. As human activities continue to reduce the thickness of the ozone layer, which shields earth from sun's UV radiation, the level of harmful sun rays continues to rise over last three decades. UV protection of infants and young children has become an important issue.
Human activities and industrialization also impact ambient air quality, which substantially affects infants' and children's health. Infants and children generally breathe more rapidly than adults. This increases their exposure to pollutants in the air. Infants and children often breathe through their mouths, bypassing the filtering effect of the nose and allowing more pollutants to be inhaled. Additionally, children and infants are more susceptible to the health effects of air pollution because their immune systems and developing organs are still immature. Exposure to toxic air contaminants during infancy or childhood could affect the development of the respiratory, nervous, endocrine and immune systems, and could increase the risk of cancer later in life.
Conventional strollers generally adopt an open design such that an occupant of the stroller is directly exposed to the harmful environmental factors. While certain strollers can have a partial shade cover that can protect the occupant from sunlight from a high angle (i.e. overhead sunlight), such shade cover generally offers little protection from scattered sunlight and sunlight from a low angle. U.S. Pat. No. 6,012,756 to K. J. Clark-Dickson (“Clark-Dickson”) discloses a flexible UV protective cover made from knitted fabric. While the UV protective cover offers more UV protection over a convention stroller with a hood or shade, a large portion of the UV protective cover is not transparent to visible light and thus partially blocks the occupant's view. Furthermore, the cover disclosed in Clark-Dickson does not protect the occupant from air pollutants. U.S. Pat. No. 6,217,099 to McKinney et al. (“McKinney”) discloses a multi-layer protective shield for a stroller. While the protective shield offer protection against sun, rain, wind, and insects, it does not protect the occupant from air pollutants. U.S. Pat. No. 6,068,322 to Kuester (“Kuester”) discloses personal protection for infants against air pollution. Kuester discloses a substantially enclosed stroller design that includes a powered filter-unit mounted on the frame of the stroller that flows filtered air towards the occupant of the stroller. However, the stroller design of Kuester cannot be readily implemented in an interchangeable stroller cover, i.e., a stroller cover that can be adjusted to fit on different strollers. Furthermore, the stroller is not designed to provide UV protection to its occupant.
Accordingly, there is a need for an interchangeable stroller cover that offers protection against both sunlight and air pollutants.